


Memory is Everything to Lose

by runsinthefamily



Category: Supernatural
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-30
Updated: 2012-04-30
Packaged: 2017-11-04 15:17:30
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 940
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/395278
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runsinthefamily/pseuds/runsinthefamily
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during 5.03, "Free To Be You and Me."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Memory is Everything to Lose

They stopped at a liquor store on the way back to their temporary squat, because if Dean wasn't going to get Cas laid on the eve of his near-certain death, he was at least going to get him drunk.

"Dean, I am not sure that I can become intoxicated," said Cas. 

"Well, watch me do it, then," said Dean and took a slug. 

Cas sat back down in the chair Dean had hauled him out of three hours previously, his blue eyes intent. His clothing was still ruffled, his tie pulled half off, his collar askew. One pale collarbone caught the light from the window. It made him look curiously young. 

"Ok, the whorehouse, a mistake, I admit that." Dean waved the bottle of scotch in Cas' general direction. "Still the most I've laughed in - I don't even remember how long." He collapsed into the dusty, musty wreck of a sofa.

"Since hell," said Cas, in that deadpan way of his. "You have not laughed that way since before you went to hell."

"Right," said Dean. The liquor haze abruptly felt less like a blanket and more like a shroud. "Right, how could I forget?"

There was a silence, in which Dean stared down at the label on the bottle and thought about the keen, delicate edge of broken glass, and how slippery it became once bloody, and how -

"I am sorry," Cas said. "I should not have have summoned those memories." 

Dean looked up into his solemn, stubbled face and huffed a short laugh. "It's not like it takes much," he said and tipped the bottle back again. 

"Still. I do not wish to cause you pain, Dean."

"If wishes were horses," Dean muttered.

"I don't understand that -"

"Not your fault," said Dean. "Your tail of doom." He waved the bottle again. "Trailing around with bad news and shitty jobs to do and now we're going to collar an archangel, great! S'what I mean. Ok, not whores, I'll remember that. But it was good to just ..." he sighed. "Good to hang out. See you smile for once. I could almost get happy to see you, man."

"You are not happy to see me." A statement of fact, tinged with something that was almost sadness.

"Cas, you throw our bacon into the fire at least as often as you pull it out," said Dean. "I mean, don't get me wrong, glad to have you on our side, but, man."

"It is true," said Cas. "I endanger you. But only because I must."

"Blah, blah, I save the world. Still not entirely sold on that one, you know." Dean swung his legs up onto the sofa, settled his head against the worn armrest. "A boozing, cursing, doubt-riddled half-demon -"

Cas was suddenly on his feet. "Stop," he said, his voice snapping with all the fire and menace of their early days, when Dean was still staggering around on rebuilt legs and trying to remember how to be a human being and Cas had been - well, Castiel. "You are not half demon, Dean. Not even remotely."

"I was on my way there," said Dean. 

"I raised you," said Cas. In three strides he was beside the sofa. His coat billowed and then pooled around him as he sank to one knee and laid his hand against Dean's shoulder, his fingers and palm aligning with the imprint there perfectly. "I raised you up, and all that was done to you was left behind."

Dean shook his head. 

"Stop," said Cas, this time gently. "I witnessed you in the Pit. I took you from there and held you in my Grace. I know you better than you know yourself, Dean. You are not a demon."

"I wish I could remember," said Dean. He was drunk, he shouldn't be saying this. But hey, mind reading angels, right? 

"Remember what?"

Dean colored, shifted under Cas' hand. "I remember - the rack, I remember Alistair. I remember ..." he trailed off, let out a breath. "I don't remember you."

Cas smiled, unexpectedly, and let Dean go. "You weren't happy to see me," he said.

Dean laughed shortly. "I guess I knew what you had in store for me."

"Then you were wiser than I," said Cas. "For I could not have imagined the ways in which you have changed me."

"Dude," said Dean, wallowing upright on the couch. "Let's not get too sentimental, alright?" He went to take another drink, contemplated the bottle for a moment, and decided against it. Hangovers and archangels probably didn't mix well. "I'm going to turn in," he said. "Feel free to hang around or whatever. Just don't watch me sleep, that shit is creepy." He pushed himself upright and looked around for his bag.

"You wept," said Cas.

"What?" He looked down at the angel.

"When I came to you," said Cas. His eyes were blue and unfathomable in the shadows. "You wept. Demons don't cry, Dean."

Dean caught his breath. For a moment, he remembered -

_\- light, a radiance that burned like the sun, a heat on skin that had forgotten everything but the cold bitter fire of Hell, a scouring that hurt worse than anything Alistair had done to him and yet he yearned toward it with everything he was, a presence that saw and loved and **knew** him down to his core, and he wept even as he fought, wanting so badly this thing that could not, could **not** be for him - _

_"Not me."_

The whisper came dry from his lips.

Cas was standing now, as usual, about six inches too close, his face all earnest, solemn focus. "You. And no other."


End file.
